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Ruapehu 2010
Great pics jude 
looks pretty icy up there. ill be down again in a week, gotta take my lil brothers skiing.
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Summer sucks!
exchange rates and seasons arent though.
Shall I stop telling the aussies to go east then and just tell them to go get lost instead...
Dont come back at me then if the lift prices jump due to having to make up the shortfall in numbers from your major market...
MACS
...sad thing is thats not really that funny.
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My worst fear is when I die my wife sells my ski equipment for the price I told her I paid for it.
BP loves those seppos macs but most of us don't mind the ozzies if they are spending heaps.
Not going to make it up today even thou its looking alright. 2 fine days at home and I'm getting heaps of sh1t done. Enjoy the snow you lucky buggars.
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If you don't like my fire don't come around.
Groundhog day (clear and calm). Don't think it is as cold as the last two mornings - will find out when I get out I guess. Feeling a bit stiff and sore and not really into it today- all the more reason to get out there and burn it off! Plus the weather is forecast to come in grotty this arvo and I might be foreced to stay inside the lodge baking for the next few days - super happy if it means freshies will cry if it's rain 
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reine de l'hiver
Snow making?
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One good turn deserves another...
Silent night on RG last night. Looked like they were going on the Express though.
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reine de l'hiver
In for a lunchtime break. Pretty much the same as yesterday - although a lot warmer. 6 deg in Valley T queue. T's stopping a lot - was told it could be people tripping the safety rope (apparently a common school holiday occurence) or the transformers not having the grunt, who knows. Snow softer today - makes the rock moguls slightly easier to navigate/avoid
I'm still skiing like a muppet - not me of course - it's the snow, narrow trails, avoiding other people etc
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reine de l'hiver
Called it quits for the day. Although I did find some moguls (not the rock ones) to play on to the skiers left in the Valley. Yesterday's crusty snow softened but a there were a few slick patches on the groomers where the thin layer of 'packed powder' had been scoured off. Wind getting up now and clouds coming in.
Top of Knoll
Big queues on Waterfall Express
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reine de l'hiver
Another great day. Snow still very firm. Pole-stabbing experiments suggested it would be really nice if it released but it stayed cold so it didn't.
Express opened in the early afternoon 
And was running at a respectable rate. Snow up top was golf-ball crud on hardpack on the groomer within a run or 2 and off trail was breakable crust on 4-5 inches of heavier snow. An excellent day for a mildly rockered mid-fat ski! My friend on K2 Obsetheds was loving it to bits. Less fun on my skinny cambered park skis.
Speaking of which, it was my first day on them. And on my first run, I hit a rock in the poorly groomed upper boneyard (someone had driven a cat up it and not bothered to have the tiller down, weak.) Bam, coreshot. Argh, weak.
Weather was immaculate. Slight breeze, sun out all day. Cloud rolled in for a few minutes and looked like it could go to bits but the sun burnt it off really fast.
Once again we spent most of the day lapping Why Not. Still lots of fun features in there. The snow either side of Big Bowl was quite nice.
In the afternoon a few guys built a fairly large kicker on the side of the valley in Why Not so we started lapping that. After a few really, really bad landings (video to come...) I finally stomped a backflip off it so really happy about that.
Ran into CCS again... stalker as ;O
i personally reckon Why nots, are better with less snow..more natural features, instead of just being a flattened out bowl.
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I personally think RAL deserve a big pat on the back for managing to get the high noon up and running in such a short timeframe. Well done guys!
Big queues on Waterfall Express
Damn queues...nothing worse than having to stop and wait for others.
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My worst fear is when I die my wife sells my ski equipment for the price I told her I paid for it.
I personally think RAL deserve a big pat on the back for managing to get the high noon up and running in such a short timeframe. Well done guys!
Are you referring to the reparation of the bent over tower?
MACS
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My worst fear is when I die my wife sells my ski equipment for the price I told her I paid for it.
Yeah, sorry should've phrased that differently, just because they had estimated 4 weeks and it seemed to happen quicker than that
Footlong,
I agree, I posted a few days ago about this and some people got confused...thought it was old news...
I agree, the effort was substantial given the climate, time of year, conditions and accessability is often under-estimated and skiers and boarders can be demanding little brats at times...
RAL have done well. Look forward to seeing the completion of the repair works on the Whakapapas side as well as that is even harder.
MACS
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My worst fear is when I die my wife sells my ski equipment for the price I told her I paid for it.
*edited 04 Jul 2010 21:08
Originally posted by: Jude
Watched people brave Front Stage - almost everyone I saw had a 'sit down' at one point. Think I'll wait that one out.
One of those people were me
I was riding it a few times through the afternoon, but quite hard pack. Certainly not worth trying the upper front stage! Would've been solid.
Went up for my first turns of the weekend, and I must say I was pretty amazed for the first weekend of the School Holidays that there were very few queues!
The Valley was open from as soon as I arrived, and there was quite a hard pack on top of a couple of inches of soft snow.
This is really where I found my groomer ski's to suffer. They struggled to break through the top layer, and when they did they buried themselves beneath
Made for some pretty hard riding but I made it work!
Took me to the afternoon on the Knoll Ridge to get my groove back, still some rocks showing around there as well. Had a chat to one of the groomer drivers who said they were working on the Valley traverse, which should hopefully open that face up for some nicer morning riding.
As has been said, with the temperatures still down the snow didn't really release and it was hard pack off-trail, and sketchy on trail all day. By about 3 in the afternoon things were hardening on trail again as well.
Decided with the weather forecast for today that I wouldn't head up for a second one, how wrong I was!! Really kicking myself, but still not a bad start to the season
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IT Hack & Genuine NutJob
@ Rozboon
You munted another pair of skis??
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reine de l'hiver
You guys must be the pros I see around the mountain
Everyone on this forum is a pro of some sort...
or a con...
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My worst fear is when I die my wife sells my ski equipment for the price I told her I paid for it.
How NOT to land a backflip - still from a video my mate took on his cellphone...
Ros,
Bit dark so is that called a blackout?
MACS
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My worst fear is when I die my wife sells my ski equipment for the price I told her I paid for it.
*edited 04 Jul 2010 22:55
Originally posted by: rozboon
How NOT to land a backflip - still from a video my mate took on his cellphone...
Nice mate. Your on a winner there with that trick, never seen a FACE drag before...mayby you should try chucking on your bents or ants and finding a 50fter to huck off instead...then you will get enough airtime.
It works when on the same skis in the ski movies so dont see why it wont for you..
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"If in doubt, straighten 'em out"
Can someone tell me what trails they have running off the high noon? Is Triangle skiable yet? ta.
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Summer sucks!
Blowing a gale here - must be gusting 100kph at least. No new snow, just the sound of wind blown stuff pelting the window (my room on southern side of lodge). So noisy I had to put the ear plugs in and even then didn't get much sleep. Think it's going to be a baking day. Doubt if it will be safe to go outside - don't want to end up over Skippers like my victims
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reine de l'hiver
*edited 05 Jul 2010 08:12
Not looking good. Tried to upload vid complete with sound effects but dial up couldn't cope 
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reine de l'hiver
as much as my toe edge traverse green legs would allow I did a few laps as far over as the ridge between branchline and slider. Whenever the last snow was (I forget, a few days ago?) it held on beautifully for us with only a very thin crust and heaps of soft stuff, fresh lines etc.. wooohoo. Good times up there.
I did another morning in the meadow, so it was an awesome afternoon, especially those last few runs up high.
windy day indoors now, catching up on the world
Originally posted by: rozboon
Ran into CCS again... stalker as ;O
haha
nasty video still of the backflip - d'oh
Originally posted by: rozboon
How NOT to land a backflip - still from a video my mate took on his cellphone...
Holy crap, that looks painful.
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Gaper.
Yeah, you can see why they call it 'The Dark Side'
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One good turn deserves another...
Originally posted by: jedski
Nice mate. Your on a winner there with that trick, never seen a FACE drag before...mayby you should try chucking on your bents or ants and finding a 50fter to huck off instead...then you will get enough airtime.
It works when on the same skis in the ski movies so dont see why it wont for you..
Yeah we were doing some pioneering work on nose drags and the occasional huge shoulder drag.
Reason I landed upside down there was cos I didn't really hit the jump hard enough (it was a pretty damn huge jump, saw rodeo 5, cork 7, 9's thrown off it)
When I landed it I went a lot bigger. I'll eventually put up the video of my mate hitting it, he goes pretty big but gets all out of shape in the air, gets a bit rodeo'd and cowpats it
Originally posted by: macs
LOL what are seppoes???
Short for Septic Tanks = Yanks
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Wait For The Ricochet
Whakas wasn't too bad on Sat according to the offspring.
Went down but didn't go riding. Decided to give the leg a bit more time to recover.
Early finish to the day tho' when the Knoll and Waterfall broke down at the same time.
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Wait For The Ricochet
oldskool,
Thanks.
MACS
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My worst fear is when I die my wife sells my ski equipment for the price I told her I paid for it.
Blizzard. Taken out window - no going outside today!
Looking up to Waterfall
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reine de l'hiver
looks like we got another south easterly storm coming next week after this one. Wish we could get some proper winter sytems hit us like way back in '08! Like this...
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I am the freedom breeder!
Originally posted by: Jude
Saw that guy with the dead cat on his head up there on saturday.
Can't decise whether it's uber cool or a complete fashion disaster....
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Wait For The Ricochet
Some brave members just walked up to lodge. Took them about 15 mins to walk from Iwikau (club) to here. Had to hunker down when big gusts came. Thought about helping them for a nano second, but decided two people suffering out there was enough.
@ Oldscool - with you on the h/cat. Same with the liftie with the short dreads and pork-pie hat
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reine de l'hiver
I'd like a coonskin cap
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Gaper.
Originally posted by: demoncleaner
looks like we got another south easterly storm coming next week after this one. Wish we could get some proper winter sytems hit us like way back in '08! Like this...
Yeah well the good ol' South Westers aren't making it past Oz these days.....the warm East fronts heading down just blast them right out of it.... so East it is, for a while anyways'.
Hope we get some good stuff from them and no rain!
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"If you see a Scotsman with a cricket bat....he's not off to play cricket...."
Stopped snowing, still blowing.
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reine de l'hiver
Had an awesome weekend up at whaka, upper mountain pretty decent, had some great runs down the waterfall t, I love those gullies.
We had a look at turoa today but it was a howling gales so went home.
I seemed everyone was learning at the weekend, happy valley packed everywhere else hardly a que, biggest wait I had was when the valley t stopped when I was on it. The valley t really didn't seem to like me when every I went down there it would stop.
Originally posted by: impreza50
The valley t really didn't seem to like me when every I went down there it would stop.
So it was your fault
Thought it was Edgehi's sheep.
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reine de l'hiver
Yeah I kept breaking it, just to annoy you. Not fun when it stops for 10 mins on your on the steep bit with no easy way off.
Originally posted by: merry
I'd like a coonskin cap
go davy crockett style
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Decent cover on upper mountain
The Pinnacles looking great
Nguruhoe
anyone ever skied Ngaruhoe?
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Ooh I want to!
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Gaper.
Jean CLaude Killy skied it in the 1970's and said it was one of the most terrifying experiences...
MACS
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My worst fear is when I die my wife sells my ski equipment for the price I told her I paid for it.
check this out..looks steep, but cool terrain
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7H90NRSp8A [youtube.com]
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Snapshots taken from some videos I filmed on Sunday morning. I might have some of you on film
Ngaruhoe does look awesome. Anyone got a spare cat or chooper?
Steep but would be awesome after the storm.
Ground hog. Nasty wind and no new snow (suspect it has been raining). Wind was really bad last night, place was shuddering - one of the younger guests looked a bit alarmed. Didn't help that I was in the middle of telling her the story about being in my club when a window blew out in the weather bomb in Jul 08.
Another day of cabin fever. Maybe I'll do some baking. Banana cake I think. Big decision - chocolate or lemon icing?
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reine de l'hiver
Snow in the forecast for the enxt 3-4 days. From the SE so dunno if thats good or bad. Clearing for the weekend possibly. Thanks to 2 fine days Sat and Sun I'm up to date 'round my property and Sunday is a goer. Time to deliver!!!
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If you don't like my fire don't come around.
I've noticed that SE storms a bit mingy in the snow dept. This one certainly is
Just saw cat taking up Knoll Cafe workers.
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reine de l'hiver
Met forecast is going for 17cm but probably over estimating it. Whatever, as long asit doesn't rain and wash the current base away
Where i come from (eastcoast) SE weather patterns mean rain, rain and more rain.
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If you don't like my fire don't come around.
definitely chocolate icing for those cold days...
blunt if you arrive sat /sun it is looking a lot better for monday....
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you gotta get up ...to get down..
God another 5 days of this....I'll get the tins full for the full lodge next week.
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reine de l'hiver
*edited 06 Jul 2010 08:43
Lemon icing much tasty.
I guess we're all still holding out and hoping for one of those 'big dumps' to come through and make all the difference. Don't think this week is going to be it though.
Even the water temperatures around Wellington have been warmer than normal for this time of year. They got cold to start with but have come up a bit again.
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IT Hack & Genuine NutJob
Originally posted by: voltaren
definitely chocolate icing for those cold days...
blunt if you arrive sat /sun it is looking a lot better for monday....
Mondays no good for me damn it! Weekend warrior mode until next school hols unfortunately. Saving what little days I have left. Its gonna have to be Sunday!
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If you don't like my fire don't come around.
*edited 06 Jul 2010 10:11
Yeah the COLA charts http://ski.com.au/weather/cola/mslp/index.html [ski.com.au] and the rest (METVU, Metservice) are all showing a shifting North East that doesn't show any signs of the needed 'Dump-beast'.
Might get some sleety stuff...but I guess you guys on the ground will keep us posted (Jude, Voltaren,etc...). Keep up the live reports for us poor city dwellers....!
Another week out tho' ....who knows....I'm going to be ready when it does come...but not before!
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"If you see a Scotsman with a cricket bat....he's not off to play cricket...."